I live in a small city, pop. 250k metro area 1M, and there is a local business news site that reports on openings, closings, and other local business news. It's

I live in a small city, pop. 250k metro area 1M, and there is a local business news site that reports on openings, closings, and other local business news. It's more or less standard that when they announce a new restaurant, bar, or brewery opening the owner will state an expected opening date a month or two in the future, and then 3-6 months later a follow up story about how they are still 1-2 months from opening. It's almost always due to unexpected snags in the permitting and licensing process. There are many different local government agencies that have to sign off: zoning, permits & inspections/building, business license, health department, ABC, the fire marshal. And if any of those agencies requires you to make changes to the building or systems you have to go through permits & inspections again. It's a system that is not optimized for speed or efficiency.